Queens
by Summersparkle
Summary: Arthur had watched how their relationship had grown over the five years they had known each other; it had been subtle changes at first, a smile or a stolen glance in his direction... Arthur/Morgana


_A/N: Hope you like it; I'm slightly obsessed with Arthur/Morgana at the moment..._

Morgana remembered the first time she saw those towering walls that belonged to Camelot's castle. The awe she had felt in those brief seconds had outweighed any trepidation that she had previously felt as she stared up at those majestic battlements, she had been fourteen at the time and had been travelling to Camelot and into King Uther's care. Her parents had perished in the battle at Irick and with her brother an impossible oaf and currently lost somewhere up in the north, Uther Had taken it as a personal mission to see her cared for. To this day she still had visions of the war, although I doubt you could call them visions, more terrors of sorts, terrors that cut through the realms of her consciousness and shook her very being to the core. They varied from night to night but one thing always remained constant, the images of her mother's screams as horde after horde of warrior came pouring into the castle, overwhelming everything in its path with the stench of death. Red. That's what she remembered seeing; everything was coated in red and the eyes, the eyes of her father cold and glassy as he lay on the pyre, the eyes of the fallen, people she would never know and now never could, and her mothers, filled with tears and wide with panic as she ushered her daughter onto the horse with her nurse. She was told to not look round to look at the forest to look to freedom, but she couldn't and the image of that castle burning would haunt her forever. The image of her life as she knew it, her very being, going up in smoke would never leave her and in that moment, in that insignificant cluster of seconds Morgana knew she could never be who she was before, she felt she had aged a life time all in the course of ten seconds.

Morgana brushed the stray tear that was dribbling down her face; she stared out toward the blackening sky. It was a sort of ritual of hers, whenever she would wake from a night terror, she would tiptoe out of her room and into the north tower, coming to rest on the ledge on the far side. It was secluded enough so no guards or passing servants could spot her, but it gave her enough of a view for her to see the city of Camelot as it lay dormant in the night. It had been five years and she still hadn't slept a night uninterrupted and now she wondered if she ever could.

It had been a month after she had arrived that Arthur had acknowledged that she was troubled, he had offered her an ear to talk about it, something she had been told, was very uncharacteristic of the young prince but she had declined none the less, she always did, it was a week after that, that he had noticed her out at the balcony. He had been silent and had listened to her ramblings all night, Morgana had thought him charming but as she smiled at him across the banquet hall the following night he had merely turned his head away, shutting her out.

Arthur was a complex person she had mused to Gwen, it had taken nearly half a year to get past his first layer only to find he had a thousand more, each more intricate and tough to crack than the previous. It was frustrating to say the least as every time Morgana felt she was making headway in understanding him, he seemed to backtrack just to confuse her more. After nearly a year of constant bickering they seemed to have developed a rapport of sorts, they would argue, moan to their servants and then forgive each other, the arguments usually lasting no more than a day or two, whilst, during the nights that followed they would laugh and joke and playfully mock each other.

The first time Morgana had aspired to become Arthur's queen was when King Bayard had come to stay at the castle, bringing his wife Emogen with him. Morgana had studied her every move, watched how her graceful fingers entwined with those of her husband and how he had doted upon her, she had watched how she carried herself, with the air of an Old Norse goddess. That was the moment when she knew she wanted to be his Queen.

Arthur had watched how their relationship had grown over the five years they had known each other; it had been subtle changes at first, a smile or a stolen glance in his direction. He thought it all harmless fun, a joke. Arthur had to admit he had never found Morgana particularly attractive, she had been a short and plump girl at fourteen, her long black hair an unruly mess on her head and those eyes, those hard chips of ice that he had grown to love, seemed almost too large for her head to handle, but she had changed it seemed as if overnight, she had grown taller, almost as tall as Arthur himself and the once endearing layers of fat that had been the subject of many of Arthurs jokes, had transformed themselves into lithe curves that seemed to entice all the men of the court, Her hair was always neatly platted or kept back in a tight bun so not to obscure her beautiful face and the eyes, her eyes, the ones that had always been so hard and cold toward him suddenly became softer and more inviting. It had troubled him at first the frustrating mix of hate and love swirling inside of him but soon it had him longing for her, wanting more than just the occasional glance in his direction.

For her eighteenth birthday his father had gone all out, spending an atrocious amount of money on a lavish banquet for her and inviting the nobles from across the land. He had been searching for an appropriate gift for her for the better part of a month and with every subtle hint to her as to the nature of his gift, she had expressed a passionate hatred to each one he suggested. He had finally decided upon a simple sliver bangle, two pieces of silver entwined in the shape of two vine branches he had thought it symbolic, their lives interlinked forever and that's when he knew, that was the moment he knew she had to be his Queen.


End file.
